# Chemical Probes of Protein Tyrosine Phosphatase Activity

> **NIH NIH R01** · UTAH STATE HIGHER EDUCATION SYSTEM--UNIVERSITY OF UTAH · 2021 · $289,750

## Abstract

Project Summary
Tyrosine phosphorylation is a key regulatory event in multiple cellular signaling pathways. The
phosphorylation and dephosphorylation of tyrosine, catalyzed by protein tyrosine kinases
(PTKs) and protein tyrosine phosphatases (PTPs), respectively, is a tightly regulated process.
Despite the approximately equal numbers of PTKs and PTPs in the human genome and similar
degrees of substrate selectivity and parallel biological regulation, comparatively little is known
about PTP activity in contrast to the significant body of literature dealing with the roles of PTKs
in cellular signaling. In particular, activity-based chemical probes that directly report on PTP
activity are of great interest because they would provide the means to monitor PTP activity in
living cells and also facilitate the study of individual PTPs in complex signaling pathways. The
long-term objective of our work is to develop chemical approaches to studying PTP activity that
can be used to answer key questions about PTP biology. Recently, we have developed a PTP-
platform technology that facilitates monitoring the activity of individual PTPs both in vitro and in
cells. This technology involves delivering fluorogenic peptide substrates to cells and monitoring
changes in fluorescence of the cells as intracellular PTPs act on the substrate. Based on our
previous success with selectively monitoring PTP activity in cells using peptide substrates, we
now develop targeted probes for several members of the PTP family of enzymes. Specifically,
we will develop a series of selective substrates and inhibitors for PTP activity that can be
used to monitor the cellular activity of multiple PTPs and address key questions about
PTP biology. Our approach can readily be applied to almost any member of the PTP family of
enzymes and we have selected a representative group for our initial investigation. In addition,
our approach should prove very useful in the development of generic PTP-targeted,
mechanism-based probes as well. The multidisciplinary research program described here takes
advantage of the Barrios laboratory’s expertise in chemical synthesis, biochemistry and
enzymology and will provide probes of great interest to the signaling biology research
community.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10221002
- **Project number:** 5R01GM135295-03
- **Recipient organization:** UTAH STATE HIGHER EDUCATION SYSTEM--UNIVERSITY OF UTAH
- **Principal Investigator:** AMY M BARRIOS
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2021
- **Award amount:** $289,750
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2019-09-20 → 2023-07-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10221002

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10221002, Chemical Probes of Protein Tyrosine Phosphatase Activity (5R01GM135295-03). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10221002. Licensed CC0.

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